Online marketing, through targeted advertising, has become a popular method for advertisers to reach customers who may be particularly interested in the products/services offered by those advertisers. Generally, a media buy plan of a graphical(display) advertising “campaign” includes a designation of parameters to trigger display of the advertising of the campaign including, for example, characteristics of a user to whom the advertising is to be displayed and/or identification of web page domains on which the advertising is to be displayed.
An advertiser may work with a “sales planner” to determine what are thought to be appropriate targeting parameters such as user characteristics and web page domains to target for display advertisements to reach a desirable target audience. Such determination is typically made heuristically. However, this heuristic determination can be difficult, particularly in a “cold start” situation, in which the advertiser and any advisor (such as an advisor affiliated with the online service providing the marketing) may not have enough relevant experience to determine the targeting parameters heuristically.
For example, FIG. 1 is a flowchart that broadly illustrates a campaign flow. At 102, start-of-campaign recommendations are provided. This would typically be provided by a sales planner. At 104, the advertisement campaign is run. At 106, in-campaign recommendations may be provided.